It has recently become useful to validate customer checks at retail establishments and shopping markets. Small desk top or counter top machines are used commercially to print receipts for transactions, and to validate customer checks. One such machine is a Model No. 7221 printer manufactured by Axiohm Corporation, Ithaca, N.Y.
Machines of this type usually have separate pathways, and separate pairs of drive and idler rollers (or undriven, pressure rollers) for each operation. That is, the validation drive has separate drive and idler rollers apart from the drive and idler rollers of the receipt printer. In other words, at least four rollers on separate shafts are normally required to provide both functions in one machine.
A customer check to be validated is normally fed into the above-identified machine by a stepper motor drive unit. The check is driven into the machine along its own pathway until all of its magnetic ink numbers have passed a magnetizing unit. Then the stepper motor is reversed, and the machine discharges the check at constant speed. During the discharge phase, the magnetized ink numbers on the check surface pass a magnetic read head, and are read and decoded. A print operation can also be implemented during this cycle.
A receipt, on the other hand, is printed in the above-identified machine by drop-in loading a roll of paper into a supply paper receiving bucket. The paper is directed along its own pathway past a print head and, optionally, a cutting blade. The printed receipt of a sales transaction emerges through its own slot in the housing of the machine.
The two separate printing and validating operations described above require two sets or pairs of drive roller shafts, two separate slots, and two separate feed paths.
In conventional inserted forms or "slip" printing/check validating type machines, the slip feed rollers must be located a predetermined distance below the print head. However, in a drop-in loading scheme, as with the present invention, the paper must pass over the pair of slip feed rollers. In other commercial printers in which the receipt paper has a narrow width and the checks or other forms to be validated are wider, the slip feed rollers may straddle the receipt. The receipt paper passes between the slip feed shafts. This configuration, however, prevents drop-in loading of the supply paper.
In other printing machines, the paper is detoured over the slip feed rollers. However, the receipt drive roller pair is not positioned next to the platen, and is incapable of pushing receipt paper around the slip rollers and platen without a second set of receipt rollers. The second set of receipt rollers is therefore necessary to prevent paper buckling and print head jamming. Once again, the second set of rollers is also a deterrent for the drop-in loading of the supply paper.
The present invention features a configuration that can permit a single check validating and receipt slot in the housing or cover of the receipt printing and check validating machine, although two, separate slots in the housing or cover can be incorporated without departing from the scope Of the invention. A fixedly positioned idler and drive combination shaft is flanked by two pivotable drive rollers, each of which drive rollers moves its respective receipt paper and check along a common drive path. During a check validating operation, a customer's check is inserted in the slot, and is driven past a magnetizing unit by a first, slip drive roller in contact with both rollers on the idler/drive combination shaft. During the sales receipt printing phase, the paper from the drop-in supply roll is driven past a printer and cutting blade by a second, receipt drive roller in contact with the idler roller that is mounted on the idler/drive combination shaft, and emerges through the same slot. The receipt drive roller is mounted on a clamshell bucket. The idler roller and the drive roller are used cooperatively in order to control and advance the receipt paper.
In other words, these two separate operations now share the same idler/drive combination shaft. The invention, therefore, has reduced the number of drive and idler roller shafts from four to three. In addition, the two separate operations can share the same pathway, and can operate through the same slot in the housing and cover. This allows the design of the machine to become more compact and less expensive than conventional machines.
The present invention has as one of its objectives to provide an improved check validating and receipt printing machine.
Another objective is to provide a compact and low-cost slip printing and check validating machine.
Yet a further objective is to provide a check validating and receipt printing machine that has less parts than conventional machines performing the same functions.
Still a further objective is to provide a machine for receipt printing and check validating that allows for drop-in loading of the receipt paper supply roll, and for complete exposure of the receipt path for jam clearance and other maintenance procedures performed in a straightforward manner.